


I Was Lightning (Before the Thunder)

by define_serenity



Series: More than a Trick of the Light [9]
Category: Glee
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Angst, M/M, Savitar - Freeform, Speed Force, Superheroes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-06-23 19:35:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15613467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/define_serenity/pseuds/define_serenity
Summary: (excerpt) In the aftermath of creating Flashpoint, Sebastian starts reliving memories he thought he'd erased. Tortured by a world that never was, he faces his greatest foe yet. Himself.





	I Was Lightning (Before the Thunder)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for **Seblaine Week 2018** , day 4: free day. 
> 
> More of my [Nightflash 'verse](https://archiveofourown.org/series/213665)! This is a smaller drabble in a much bigger story following the last installment [Waiting for a Light that Never Comes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7701430), but I had/have no time to write the bigger one. ENJOY!

  


.

 

His feet land shakily on the concrete floor as he emerges from the Speed Force, his body re-aligning with the correct layer of space-time, knees knocking together finding his bearings again.

The world spins for a second or two, speed losing its momentum, everything slowly settling in place before he remembers what he’d been so eager to return to.

“Sebastian,” he whispers, and turns to find him huddled in a corner of the depot, legs pulled up to his chest, the ghosts of Flashpoint having left their marks deep inside his soul. These past few weeks took a toll greater than he could’ve imagined, and he fears any damage Sebastian’s ghost hoped to achieve had already been done.

Would the nightmares ever end? Or would he be doomed to wake up to Sebastian’s screams every night, the cold sweats and the tears that followed, the love of his life left a shell as punishment for his actions.

That isn’t what the Speed Force promised.

“Sebastian?” he says, kneeling at his boyfriend’s side, touching a careful hand to his hair. 

How long was he gone? How long has Sebastian had to stir in the thought that he’d created a version of himself that could kill, that saw no light in anything or anyone, who would rob him of everything he held dear?

When Sebastian looks up and finds his eyes he thinks it might’ve been years, red lining green irises, lips bitten raw, skin crawling with a springlike kind of fear that speaks volumes about the state of mind he’s in. One touch and he might evaporate, one kiss and he might turn to dust, swept up by the maelstrom of time and space Sebastian once thought to control. 

“Hey,” he hushes, and wraps his dark cape around them both. “It’s okay. He’s gone.”

But the man curled up in front of him isn’t who he used to be, dismissing his words with a shake of his head. This man barely shoulders the weight of his mistakes, the consequences to his actions, the great responsibility he saw fit to disrespect. 

That’s what the Speed Force punished Sebastian for.

“What if half of what I carry are dead worlds, Blaine?” Sebastian cries, and the question doesn’t miss its effect; can he carry this with Sebastian, the knowledge of another world, another timeline, one Sebastian unmade because he couldn’t bear to live in a world without him? 

One unmaking Sebastian right now. 

It’s not what the Speed Force promised.

“Abandoned time remnants of me intent on destroying every- everyone I love?” Sebastian sobs, gasping for air, and he tears at the leather of his suit as if it could peel away the aberrations the Speed Force put in his path. “Worlds where you-”

Can he carry this, the knowledge of a changeable universe, one subject to change by a speedster’s heart? It’d never been an easy thing to hear, how Sebastian risked everything, how he’d carried that secret for such a long time, but Sebastian had loss carved along his heart seams long before anyone ever should experience it. 

He doesn’t blame Sebastian. People make mistakes. 

It’s like he told the other one: there is no version of Sebastian he couldn’t love, because there will never be a version of Sebastian lacking the light he’d accredit to him alone. Scars or not. Secrets or not. Demons or not.

“I saw your dad,” he says, “In the Speed Force”, hoping it will shave off some of the hurt these would-be other worlds have left, along with the scarred half-speedster that’d come after them.

Sebastian stills completely, his brow lowering, quiet shock coloring his features a shade darker, one startlingly close to the one his time remnant wore. No words pass his lips, long since run out of any meaningful ones, but tears roll gently down his cheeks. It breaks his heart to see Sebastian like this, braced against further impact, because what’s one more punch, what’s one more nightmare in this unending stream of agony?

“He said it’s all over, Sebastian.”

“Over?” Sebastian asks. “Wh-”

He inches closer and throws his arms around his boyfriend, who lets out another cry before burying his face into his chest. Sebastian shivers and shakes and releases all the pain built up these weeks gone by, the months before that, the years of thinking himself unworthy, selfish, weak. 

The Speed Force made him promises and he would keep it to those if he had to fight time and space itself.

People make mistakes. 

But people learn from them too. 

 

 

 

**\- fin -**

****

**Author's Note:**

> [post @ tumblr](http://ttinycourageous.tumblr.com/post/176764954023)


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